opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

21 - 31 May 2023

21 May: Martin Amis (1949-2023) | M.John Harrison Q & A
22 May: International Prize for Arabic Fiction | Annie Ernaux profile | Martin Heidegger's Changing Destinies review
23 May: Premio Strega Europeo | NSW Premier's Literary Awards
24 May: International Booker Prize | Dino Buzzati's Il deserto dei Tartari
25 May: Princess of Asturias Award for Literature | Macunaíma review
26 May: Neustadt International Prize finalists | Dublin Literary Award | Peter Zeindler (1934-2023) | Bad Kids review
27 May: Greatest children's books ? | Geetanjali Shree Q & A
28 May: Korean literature abroad | Choose Your Own Adventures ... to the Booker
29 May: Sade exhibit | Biography of X review
30 May: Jnanpith Award | James Tait Black shortlists | Premio Reina Sofía | Daniel Hahn Q & A
31 May: VCU Cabell finalists | Encyclopedia review

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       VCU Cabell finalists

       They've announced the three finalists for this year's VCU Cabell First Novelist Award

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Encyclopedia review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Richard Horn's 1969 novel-as-Encyclopedia.
       This was long out of print; great to see Tough Poets Press reviving it.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Jnanpith Award

       They've announced the winner of the 2022 Jnanpith Award, the leading Indian author prize, and it is Damodar Mauzo; see, for example, the PTI report.
       The Goan author writes in Konkani; his novel Karmelin has been translated into English -- see the Indian Novels Collective information page -- as have several story-collections, including Teresa's Man; see also the Rupa publicity page.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       James Tait Black shortlists

       They've announced the shortlists for this year's James Tait Black Prizes, "Britain's longest-running literary prize".
       One of the four fiction finalists is under review at the complete review: After Sappho by Selby Wynn Schwartz.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Premio Reina Sofía

       They've announced the winner of this year's Premio Reina Sofía de Poesía Iberoamericana, the leading Latin American poetry prize, and it is Gioconda Belli; see, for example the EFE report at El País.

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       Daniel Hahn Q & A

       In the Hindustan Times Kunal Ray has an Interview: Daniel Hahn, translator - “Awards are a statement of what we value”.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Sade exhibit

       At the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona there's an exhibit devoted to the The 120 Days of Sodom-author running through 15 October, Sade: Freedom or evil, exploring: "the aesthetic, philosophical and political legacy of the Marquis de Sade in contemporary culture, from the early 20th-century avant-gardes to the present day".

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Biography of X review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Catherine Lacey's Biography of X, which has been getting a lot of attention.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Korean literature abroad

       Another article on how Korean literature in translation enjoys growing universal appeal, this one by Kwak Yeon-soo in The Korea Times, this time with a focus on international literary awards that Korean fiction in translation -- not just into English -- has been nominated for this year.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Choose Your Own Adventures ... to the Booker

       In The Guardian The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida-author Shehan Karunatilaka explains How Choose Your Own Adventures helped me win the Booker prize.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Greatest children's books ?

       "BBC Culture polled 177 books experts from 56 countries in order to find the greatest children's books ever" and the results are now in; see their list of The 100 greatest children's books of all time.
       I've read quite a few of these -- but mostly in younger years; only one of the titles is under review at the complete review: Philip Pullman's Northern Lights (published in the US as The Golden Compass), which came in at number six.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Geetanjali Shree Q & A

       At The White Review Reya Divekar has an Interview with Geetanjali Shree, the author of Tomb of Sand and The Empty Space.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Neustadt International Prize finalists

       They've announced the nine finalists for the 2024 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, a leading author prize; works by some of them are under review at the complete review:

• Chris Abani
  • Becoming Abigail
• Angie Cruz
• Ananda Devi
• Jenny Erpenbeck
  • Not a Novel
  • Visitation
• Nona Fernández
• Juan Felipe Herrera
• Maxine Hong Kingston
• Valeria Luiselli
  • Faces in the Crowd
  • The Story of My Teeth
• Shahrnush Parsipur
  • Touba and the Meaning of Night
  • Women without Men

       The winner will be chosen at this year's Neustadt Lit Fest, scheduled for 23-25 October.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Dublin Literary Award

       They've announced the winner of this year's Dublin Literary Award, which pays out: "€100,000 for a single work of fiction in original English or translated into English", and it is Marzahn, Mon Amour by Katja Oskamp, in Jo Heinrich's translation.
       See also the Peirene Press publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Peter Zeindler (1934-2023)

       Swiss mystery author Peter Zeindler has passed away; see, for example, the SRF report.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Bad Kids review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Chen Zijin's Bad Kids, now also (almost) out in the US.

       Certainly good to see more crime fiction from China -- definitely a literary area in which they still lag. But, hey, they've begun to catch up with science fiction, so maybe there's hope.
       This is still pretty rough -- but it has made the shortlist of this year's Crime Writers' Association Dagger for Crime Fiction in Translation.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Princess of Asturias Award for Literature

       They've announced that this year's Princess of Asturias Award for Literature will go to Murakami Haruki.

       This prize has a solid list of previous winners, though it is a bit all over the place -- last year's winner was playwright Juan Mayorga who, let's face it, doesn't quite have Murakami's international profile ..... (They also gave it to a songwriter before the Nobel folks did, setting that awful precedent -- Leonard Cohen in 2011, the year before Philip Roth got it.)

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Macunaíma review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of a new translation, by Katrina Dodson, of Mário de Andrade 1928 Brazilian classic, Macunaíma: The Hero with No Character, now out from New Directions in the US and Fitzcarraldo in the UK.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       International Booker Prize

       They've announced the winner of this year's International Booker Prize, and it is Time Shelter, by Georgi Gospodinov, in Angela Rodel's translation.
       Quite a lot of the winners of the International Booker Prize -- and the predecessor Independent Foreign Fiction Prize -- are under review at the complete review.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Dino Buzzati's Il deserto dei Tartari

       At Public Books Lawrence Venuti writes about Crossing “The Tartar Steppe”: A New Buzzati.
       Originally published in English in 1952, in a translation by Stuart Hood -- the version under review at the complete review --, New York Review Books has now published a new translation by Venuti, as The Stronghold; see also their publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org or Amazon.co.uk.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Premio Strega Europeo

       They've announced the winner of this year's Premio Strega Europeo, the leading Italian prize for a work in translation, and it is Emmanuel Carrère's V13.
       See also the P.O.L publicity page; it's not yet available in English, but is apparently coming out from Jonathan Cape in the UK; I expect there will be a US edition as well..

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       NSW Premier's Literary Awards

       They've announced the winners of this year's NSW Premier's Literary Awards, a leading Australian literary prize.
       The Christina Stead Prize for Fiction went to Women I Know by Katerina Gibson.
       This was also a year when they awarded the biennial NSW Premier's Translation Prize -- won by Tiffany Tsao for her translation of Budi Darma's People from Bloomington.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       International Prize for Arabic Fiction

       They've announced the winner of this year's International Prize for Arabic Fiction, the leading Arabic-language fiction prize, and it is تغريبة القافر ('The Water Diviner'), by Omani author Zahran Alqasmi

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Annie Ernaux profile

       In The Observer Alice Blackhurst profiles Annie Ernaux, in ‘If it’s not a risk… it’s nothing’: Nobel laureate Annie Ernaux on her unapologetic career.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Martin Heidegger's Changing Destinies review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Guillaume Payen's Martin Heidegger's Changing Destinies: Catholicism, Revolution, Nazism, recently out in English from Yale University Press.

       I should be reviewing some actual Heidegger -- but with the collected works a planned 102 (!) volumes, there's ... a lot.
       I am surprised by how little attention this has gotten from US/UK reviewers -- though I figure the usual suspects (The New York Review of Books; Times Literary Supplement; London Review of Books) will eventually get around to it. It doesn't seem to have gotten much German coverage either, where it was published in translation last year.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       Martin Amis (1949-2023)

       As widely noted, British author Martin Amis has died; see, for example, obituaries in The New York Times (by Dwight Garner) and The Guardian (by Sarah Shaffi).
       As shocking as the news is, what most surprised me was to learn that ... he had moved to Florida, dying 'at his home in Lake Worth, Florida'. After all the fuss the literary media made about him moving to and living in Brooklyn, how did this not get widely reported and covered ? (Also: too bad Amis never publicly weighed in on Florida's governor.)
       Several of his works are under review at the complete review -- though I haven't reviewd anything of his in some fifteen years:

• Experience
• Heavy Water
• House of Meetings
• Koba the Dread
• Night Train
• The Second Plane
• The War against Cliché
• Yellow Dog

       I read his (generally much more impressive) earlier work before I started the site, and haven't revisited it, but he was certainly always an author to pay attention to.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       M.John Harrison Q & A

       M.John Harrison -- Light, etc. -- has a new (anti-)memoir out, Wish I Was Here -- alas, apparently only in UK edition, so far; see the Serpent's Tail publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.co.uk -- and at The Guardian Anthony Cummins has a Q & A with him, M John Harrison: ‘I want to be the first human to imitate ChatGPT’.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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